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How Do You Get The Most Out of Domain Names You Own?

Our company has roughly 100 domain names which have been sitting on the shelf for sometime now, and I'd like to put these to work for us.

The domains we own are basically what you would consider long/short tail keywords but as the domain name.

Option 1: I take these domain names and turn them into their own sites linking to each other and providing information about that long tail keyword on that page, then link it back to our main site.

Option 2: Or do I just use them as a redirect to our main website's content that discusses that topic?

Option 1 seems like a good idea since all these long tail keywords are similar and I can link these to each other. But I wonder if these all need their own domain (host) to get the most out of their links, or making them a sub domain and pointing them to each other is okay? An example of this is from Industrial Directory they own many top keywords like automotiverubber.com rubberbellows.com and it seems they use the same server to host all these domains (pinged a few to get their ips), but by having different servers wouldn't it give more juice to the links?.. albeit a pain in the butt to manage.

Option 2 seems like it would only be viable if somebody physically types in the URL, but since it is just a redirect it would never appear in any search engine and give no juice. My other concern is how people I observe go to domains; unless its a major brand (Pepsi, Coke, UPS, FedEx ect..) they don't type in the URL browser the domain, rather they go to Google and use them to figure out what they actually want.

So, I'm wondering what you guys do, and general practices to get the most out of these types of domains.

Lots of questions in there but if anybody has information, answers or links to related articles I would really appreciate some input.

6 Responses

I believe that the best way to succeed is to limit your efforts to a very small number of sites - like one (at most two) in each industry. Then put all of your energy, effort, ideas and resources into building and promoting that site.

I used to have a lot of hotdog stand sites then built a big site that clobbered every one of them and most competitors - because it received 60 hours a week of effort instead of 40 minutes.

In most types of battle, "divide and conquer" is the winning strategy. If you build a hundred sites you just divided yourself nicely into a lot of weak forces that the enemy can crush one-by-one.

For domains... I try to get a short tail keyword domain because I believe that the conversion rate on them is better and they are very easy to remember. That offsets their usual high cost.

Looking down the road... competition on the web is getting fierce and big authoritative sites are the ones that are kickingtheass. You will not last much longer if you are fighting with a potato gun.

You said: "...has roughly 100 domain names which have been sitting on the shelf for sometime now."

This leads me to believe there is no site/sites associated with them. Is that true?

If there are no sites, then redirecting them for any reason other than people occasionally type that in is a waste. There are no links to them and there is nothing to pass on. Just the same as in option 2.

If they are domains you believe someone will use against you in competition, keep them on the shelf. If you think they are not that valuable to you, sell them at auction.

You asked: "This leads me to believe there is no site/sites associated with them. Is that true?"

Yes, we just own the domain and have not generated content for them. However, we do have the ability and staff to generate unique content for each domain. And if by doing so, we would want use this to get a link back to our main website.

You stated: "If they are domains you believe someone will use against you in competition, keep them on the shelf. If you think they are not that valuable to you, sell them at auction."

We do think that somebody can use the domains to benefit their company (which is actually why we bought them), in our market (Rubber Manufacturing) there is strong competition, not only in the US, but overseas. Therefor if the domains can be used, they should be. The question is what is the best way to utilize these types of domains?

Thank you Robert & EGOL for taking your time and lending me some of your experience and knowledge.

I was tasked with doing something with these domains, if that something happens to be nothing then that is okay by me, I just will have to support my proposal. I was to understand that having the domain is better then somebody else having it, so by owning them and not doing anything with them I will have to justify. While I will certainly use this post in my justification if there is any articles or books that you maybe able to direct me to would help.

If you are to use them I would do as EGOL suggested and do one or two (probably one). Then, on the others, don't use privacy or any of the other stuff that registrars try to see, and just hold them. It costs at most about $1K for that many domains per year.

As to books or articles, just type in micro sites or satellite sites into the moz search field and see what pops up. Best

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